


happy is the man

by PuzzledHats



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-09
Updated: 2014-06-09
Packaged: 2018-02-03 23:11:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1759319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuzzledHats/pseuds/PuzzledHats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Oliver proposes to Felicity and one time she proposes to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	happy is the man

**Author's Note:**

  * For [quisinart4](https://archiveofourown.org/users/quisinart4/gifts).



> This fic is dedicated to my dear friend, [Quisinart4](http://archiveofourown.org/users/quisinart4/pseuds/quisinart4)! Only for her would I attempt established relationship and ignore the upcoming surprise kid storyline.
> 
> Happy Birthday!! You're the best thing to ever happen to me in this fandom. Thanks for being my friend, encouraging me and making me laugh. You're the greatest! Also, thank you for being an all around wonderful human being! All I want in life is to be more like you!!!

 

****

**(special thanks to[fromfanontocanon](http://archiveofourown.org/users/fromfanontocanon/pseuds/fromfanontocanon) for the cover art!!)**

 

 **Happy is the man who finds a true friend, and far happier is he who finds that true friend in his wife.      -Franz Schuber**

 

* * *

 

**1.**

“We’re getting married,” he demands, the minute the doctor has closed the door in a huff. He knows he went a little overboard asking the doctor questions, but he couldn’t stop himself. He needed to know everything and having to wait two whole hours before getting answers had put him on edge.

“Oliver,” Felicity says with an eye roll. “Isn’t that a little extreme.”

“No,” he says, completely serious. “They wouldn’t let me back here to see you because I wasn’t family. I didn’t know anything until Dig got here. _Why_ is he your emergency contact?"

“I don’t know. He’s always been my emergency contact,” she says with a shrug.

“Not me?” He asks, trying to get his annoyance in check.

“Oliver,” Felicity says in that tone that he knows means she’s indulging him. “You’ve got so much on your plate. Between QC, Verdant, and other nightly activities. You’re not really the most stable emergency contact. Plus, Dig and I look out for each other.”

He hates that she has a point, slumping down to sit next to her on the bed, weaving the fingers of their left hands together. He’d always just assumed he was her emergency contact. Always thought if she was in trouble, she’d call him first. It’s yet another reminder of how much he has pushed her away over the years. Yet another price to pay for waiting so long to take action.

“I was scared,” he confesses. “You and I have finally started to figure this out. How to make us work. The thought—”

“I’m still here,” she says, pulling on his hand until he leans forward enough so she can drop a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth. He smiles into it, still in love with being able to be so free with her. “Just a few stitches after a minor run in with an absent minded bicyclist. They didn’t even give me the good ‘aspirin.’”

He laughs, pulling back enough to take in her whole face, his hand reaching up automatically to gently trace over the bandage on her cheek. The doctor had said there wouldn’t be a scar, a fact that only seemed to disappoint Felicity.

“So that’s a ‘no’ to us getting married,” he says with a small smile.

“How about we start with me changing my emergency contact?”

“Sounds good,” he says, before standing up to stretch his muscles while scanning the room. He spots a chair in the corner, pulling it over so it’s parallel to the bed. Sinking into it,  he reaches out to once again entwine their fingers together as he settles into a more comfortable spot on the chair.

“Oliver,” she says, squeezing his hand. “It’s been a long night. You should go home. Sleep in a real bed.”

He doesn’t say anything, just rolls his head to look at her, raising his eyebrows in challenge. She laughs, shaking her head a little as she gives in. He watches her slide down the bed a little, adjusting the pillow before closing her eyes. Her hand in his slackens slightly as she falls asleep.  She’d call it weird but he can’t help but watch her.

Since the island, since everything, he’d never seen marriage in his future, never seen a family of his own. He’s always assumed he would die long before he got the chance. But here, now, with Starling finally starting to rebuild, with less crime and more jobs? It seemed like the future was looking brighter; seemed like maybe the world wouldn’t need the Arrow for much longer.

He can’t help but smile at the thought, moving a little in the chair to get in a more comfortable position, his gaze falling to her left hand clasped in his. Sure, getting married would make sense financially and legally. But Oliver knows that feeling growing in his chest has nothing to do with the legal ramifications of marrying Felicity and everything to do with the idea of future free of conflict with someone he loves.

That idea makes him smile even more, his last thought as he drifts off to sleep of the emerald ring sitting in the Queen family vault that would look perfect on Felicity’s finger.

 

 

**2.**

“It’s _perfect_?”

“Pretty much,” Oliver says, hitting the button for the top floor.

“You’ve seen like fifteen other places,” Felicity says. “And found something wrong in all of them. But this one has everything?”

“I think so,” he says smiling down at her as he rocks back on his heels. She smiles back, before squaring her shoulders as the elevator dings announcing their arrival to the penthouse. With a hand on the small of her back he guides her in, motioning for the waiting realtor to begin his tour.  

He watches her carefully as they make their way through the apartment. Watches as her eyes light up at the floor-to-ceiling windows, watches the way she smiles when the realtor explains about the fiber connection and barely contains himself from laughing at her side eye when she’s told of the secret elevator to the parking garage. But it isn’t until the realtor has left them to ‘get a feel’ for the place that he speaks.

“What do you think?” he asks in what he knows is a too eager a tone.

“I mean, the place is great,” Felicity says, turning in a circle on the spot to take in the penthouse apartment with breathtaking views of Starling City. “But isn’t it a little too big? What are you going to do with five bedrooms?”

“Easy,“ he says holding up his hand to count on his fingers. “We’ll make the room next to the master bedroom a walk-in closet for you and all your shoes. One bedroom we will turn into a home office. And the remaining two will be for…”

He trails off as he gets to the last two fingers on his hand. He looks up to find her staring at him, her mouth open a little. He mentally kicks himself, wishing he hadn’t spoken. With all too much clarity, he remembers that last time he assumed his girlfriend would want to move in, remembers the loneliness that followed.

But he can’t help that the first thing he thought when he walked into this place was that he could see them living there, the two of them, as a family. And if it had two extra bedrooms, well he had plans for those too. He wants to tell her all of it, but the fear of her rejecting the idea, of not wanting the same future stops him short.

 “And the last two bedrooms will be for all your arrows,” she says, letting him off the hook with a smile.

“Yeah, my arrows,” he says with a small smile. Because joke or not, that isn’t what he wants at all. Not even close.

 

 

**3.**

“We had an abnormally normal Saturday,” Felicity says as she walks past him into their apartment.

“Normal?”

“Yeah, “ she says, placing her purse on the hallway table as he toes off his shoes. “We went to a farmer’s market this morning."

“To scout the farmer we suspected was dealing opium,” he reminds her.

“We met up with Dig and Lyla for coffee,” she continues, moving into their living room to set the alarm as he trails along behind her.

“To inform them that the farmer was not selling opium,” Oliver says.

“We had a nice casual afternoon of house work.”

“You had me rearrange the entire foundry,” Oliver snorts, as she clicks on the light in their bedroom. “All because Sara has convinced you Feng Shui matters.”

“And then we rounded out the evening by having a nice, intimate dinner, just the two of us,” she says with a smile as she turns on her heels to look up at him.

“We ate Big Belly Burger in the back of the van during a stakeout,” he deadpans, trying feebly to resist smiling down at her antics.

“See,” she says, holding out her hands as if to display the day. “Perfectly normal.”

“Perfect,” he can’t help but agree with her, stepping forward to wrap his arms around her waist while simultaneously pushing her back toward the bed. “Well almost.”

She laughs at that, her arms reaching up around his neck to pull him with her as she falls back onto the bed. They end up both laughing as they try unsuccessfully to undress each other; Felicity accidentally elbowing him in the chest when she reaches over to grab a condom from the bedside table.

“Okay,” she says, her breath hitching a little in her throat causing him to grin into her neck as he slowly fills her. He shifts up onto his forearms as she pulls her leg up a little to change the angle, causing them to both to exhale, before she’s smiling up at him. “Now it’s perfect.”

He’s about to let out a full body laugh, but then her hips push up and the laughter dies in his throat, turning into a strangled incoherent moan. He knows what she wants, his body moving, his hands finding their way across her body until she’s gripping his hair tightly as he picks up speed.

“Felicity,” he whispers into her ear as he moves inside of her. They’re both on the edge, he can feel her entire body begin to coil as the buildup reaches breaking point. Her hands move to grab his ass, pulling him closer as she moves her hips to meet his.

“Oliver,” she breathes against his shoulder.

“Marry me, Felicity,” he says as her orgasm takes her and then him along with it. Because their idea of a ‘perfect day’ might be crazy to anyone else, but to them, to him, it’s everything he thought he didn’t deserve. And he doesn’t want it to end. Ever.

She doesn’t respond to his question, just snuggles into his shoulder after they’ve cleaned up, moving his arm until it’s wrapped around her waist. He doesn’t push the matter, even though he’d said it all seriousness. Instead he pulls her closer, content in the idea that someday they’d get there.

 

 

**4.**

He thought about asking Thea for advice, but in the end he does what Felicity always does, turns to the internet. He reads countless articles and first hand accounts, so that by the time he’s got it all planned out he thinks he has every angle covered.

Reservations at Table Salt. Violinist hired to set the mood. Special no drip candles brought in to create the right atmosphere. Everything was perfect, right down to the homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream they would be served for dessert.

What he hadn’t planned on was two animal right’s activists taking the entire restaurant hostage, demanding that Starling City go vegan. It takes Felicity thirty seconds to signal both Dig and Detective Lance. It takes Oliver five minutes to find the perfect time to ‘accidentally' trip the one gunman into falling into the other, effectively disarming them both. It takes another hour and a half of giving statements and being checked over by paramedics before Lance gives them the okay to go home.

“What a night,” Felicity says, shivering a little as they wait for the valet to pull around with the car.

“Not _exactly_ what I had planned,” he says as he shrugs out of his suit jacket.

“What exactly did you have planned?” she asks with a laugh.

“I was planning on asking you to marry me,” he groans, throwing the jacket over her shoulders.

“Oh,” she says, her eyebrows raising in understanding as she holds the lapels closed, burrowing under the collar. “I see.”

“Yeah,” he says, wondering if he’ll ever get it right. He thought it would be perfect; that fate was finally aligning to make it all work out.

“You were going to ask me to marry you in the middle of a crowded restaurant?”

“Well, yeah,” he says, coming out of his lost thought process to stare down at her in confusion.

“Let me guess,” Felicity says. “The ring was going to be in the champagne glass.”

He nods, watching closely as the smile on her face grows. She shakes her head, before pulling on his arm until it’s wrapped around her body.

“You’re a walking cliche, Oliver Queen,” she giggles, before reaching up to press a quick kiss to his cheek. “And I love you for it.”

 

 

**5.**

It’s a quiet Sunday morning. The kind of Sunday morning they don’t see often and Oliver knows a perfect opportunity when he sees one. He retrieves the ring and there, in the middle of their kitchen, while Felicity is pulling mugs down from the cabinet in order to enjoy her morning cup of coffee, he drops to one knee.

Oliver’s not a man of many words, but he doesn’t let that stop him. Because explaining all the reasons he loves Felicity has never been a problem for him. By the time he finally gets to asking the question there are tears in both their eyes.

“Yes,” she says, throwing herself at him with such force that it almost knocks him over.

 

**+1**.

He’s laying in a hospital bed with two cracked ribs, thanking the heavens above that he made it out of the fight alive. He can hear Thea yelling at a nurse in the hallway because they refuse to let anyone but family back to see him.

“She’s his fiancé. Can you please make an exception?” Thea asks loudly, clearly not caring who hears her making a fuss. His eyelids become too heavy as he waits for the nurse's response, vaguely wanting to laugh because he knows the nurse doesn’t stand a chance against Thea.

When he wakes, the room is dark and he’s no longer alone in his bed. Curled up on his good side, Felicity’s head rests on his chest.

“Hey,” he says, running his hand through her hair, wondering if she’s asleep. Her head pops up, turning her body until she can look up at him.

“Hi,” she says, her hair has fallen out of her normally perfect ponytail and he can tell from her swollen eyes that she’s been crying. He doesn’t hesitate to pull her in close, ignoring the pain in his ribs as she grabs him tightly.

 When she finally pulls back, her hands cup his face, her own expression telling him just how worried she’d been.

“Let’s get married,” she says, her voice cracking a little as fresh tears form in her eyes.

“I thought that’s what we were planning on doing next month,” he says, his hand reaching up to trace the engagement ring on her left hand. “Remember? Or did I imagine all the cake testing? The meetings with your Rabbi and my Priest trying to figure out the mixed ceremony? I’m pretty sure I couldn’t have made up that trip to the florist.”

“No,” she shakes her head a little. “Let’s get married now. No waiting. We can still do the big wedding. But I don’t want to wait another second. Let’s do it right now. Tonight.”

“Okay,” he says, the smile growing on his face as he nods his head. “Yeah, let’s get married.”

She smiles back at him, kissing him once quickly on the lips before she’s climbing off the bed and calling to Thea in the hallway.

In the end, the only people to witness the marriage of Felicity Smoak to Oliver Queen are Thea, Roy, Diggle and a slightly cranky hospital chaplain. There are no flowers, flowing white dresses, or a single piece of cake.

Just two people, surrounded by those who love them, promising to be partners until the end.


End file.
